In what ways did the ideals of America provide an ideal to strive for rather than a lived reality?

Question

I really need help answering this question for my American History Assignment.

Answer 1

Most importantly, I think that the Declaration of Independence provided an ideal to strive for in its claim that "all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." The treatment of Native Americans, African Americans, women, and immigrants throughout American history has shown that, while Jefferson and the other members of the Continental Congress sought after those ideals and desired them for the country in abstract, the lived experience of the vast majority of Americans did not reflect those ideals. Through the Reconstruction Amendments, the 19th Amendment, the Civil Rights Act of 1954/Voting Rights Act of 1965, America is moving slowly towards those ideals becoming a lived reality for everyone within her borders, but the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution both provide lofty ideas of what should be rather than the historical reality of what has been.